Special
Features / May 2007
The Woman Behind ManPower
 Diane Strong-Treister
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By Pat Lawrence
Diane Strong-Treister has a different take on ‘temporary’. The owner of eleven Manpower offices in West Virginia and Kentucky, she says “Temporary can be four hours or fourteen years!” She’s a woman who knows from experience that it isn’t how much time, but what is done with the time, that matters.
Originally from Wilkesville, Ohio, a town of 200 people, Diane says, “I knew I didn’t belong there!” She took classes at Rio Grande and started her business career there in sales. Computers were big, in size, price and potential, so in 1980, Diane moved to Huntington, and later Charleston, to pursue the new specialty.
“The least expensive computer we sold was $10,000 and it was huge!”
During the next four years she met and married her husband, and had their first child. But, while waiting for yet another transfer, after four years, Diane realized the traveling sales life just wasn’t what she wanted. “So, I got my real estate license, and went into commercial real estate.” Her efforts leasing space in Laidley Towers were so successful, “I worked myself right out of a job!”
Her husband Loren owned a temporary services company with two WV offices and had just bought another in Ashland, KY. He asked Diane if she would help out. “I was going to work three days a week, from 10-4 and share time with another woman working there who had a baby. I came to work and did accounting for the Charleston office, but, of course, those hours lasted about a week!”
The part-time job turned into full time career. Diane and Loren ran the business together for the next eleven years. Diane says, “My forte is opening markets. I love going into a brand new area and meeting everyone.”
When the couple decided to open Bridgeport office, Diane “was pregnant with our second child. We’d leave every Sunday with Zach and come home Wednesday or Thursday. Since it was temporary, we furnished the apartment with our lawn furniture and I took my sewing machine for something to do.” The next year, they opened a new office in Morgantown. “This time I took both boys - and a babysitter!
In 1991, Diane gave birth to their daughter, “the same year we opened the Parkersburg and Teays Valley offices. It was a lot of work, but people are so nice to you when you’re pregnant!” They opened the Ripley office in 1993, and soon followed it with Prestonsburg, Kentucky.
By 1995, Diane was implementing her latest idea. “I had a dream to open a professional office for degree’d individuals and information technology people.”
In December, Loren was diagnosed with a brain tumor. “They told us he had three months to live.” Diane would not give in to despair - or give up hope. Between trips to Mayo Clinic, caring for three children, ages 4, 6 and 7 and opening the new office, she kept searching for other options.
“I found a new treatment available in Boston. We flew there on December 22 for surgery to remove the tumor. The decision was very hard. There was a high possibility of paralysis. But, it was better than the certainty of death.”
Loren had surgery the next day, followed by 22 months of treatment. Diane says, “From 3 months to 22 months was a gift.”
For a while, Diane ran the business from Boston. “Manpower International was very supportive and the staff here was great. Everything was handled through Fed-Ex and computers!”
Loren died in October of 1997. The two sons are in college now and their daughter is in high school Diane says, “If I hadn’t learned the business before Loren passed away, I don’t know what we would have done.”
She works long, late hours during the week, though not weekends. Manpower has about fifty employees and files between 5700-8000 W-2’s a year. “That’s a lot of interviewing, since we don’t hire everyone. We’ve heard every possible excuse for why someone didn’t go to work!”
Manpower places individuals in clerical, administrative, industrial and professional positions. In addition to employment services, they offer training and IT courses for temporary employees. Some people work days or weeks, others are on assignment for 1-2 years. They may be replaced or hired permanently. Diane says, “Manpower is a great opportunity for college kids but also for mothers and semi-retired workers reintroducing themselves to the workplace. We never stop learning here.”
When she isn’t working, Diane is with her kids or digging in the garden. “I got into gardening when Loren was sick. I’m always ready to get into the dirt. When things get hectic, I rev up the rototiller!”
She says, “My glass is always half full. And, I’ve taught my children to think that, too. None of us has any tolerance for petty, negative things. We know every minute counts.”
Copyright © 2007 A Woman's View. All rights reserved.
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